science

recent months i’ve been studying intensively the art of filming — that means in my free time — especially all about the most recent camera technology and possibilities. the basics i have studied for years already as a hobby, including the light, sound, composition of the shot etc etc .. but i had no good video camera for a very long time. now i have one pro film camera and a good photo camera with filming capacity in good quality (both are several years old models but still good enough today). few days ago i got lucky to capture some singers of opera in paris subway..

Opera in subway, Paris, ©°^^K

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL9O-7DpqFvSj8j1l1fmqg5-PpVblZMRT1

about the sound: the channels are set on different levels, and one channel has the limiter on — these settings are for professional sound editing while using the original recording. i have no time to edit the sound so i dropped it as it is with the video. it may feel strange in some places (and one channel is at times clipping), without mastering the sound properly. i leave it for those who have the time and professional interest to get much better sound from the original files — link to my contact is below.

obviously i have more footage and in better quality — those here are just examples with a reduced bitrate for sharing online. if you’re interested to obtain the original copies — i mean if you’re a professional from broadcasting, and the opera singers on the videos — here’s my contact ..

https://old.rip/2022/12/26/about-contact-other-info/

and of course feel free to donate if you desperately wish to support my work, writings and research ..

https://old.rip/2022/12/18/making-clear-the-donations/

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the videos are also available on my YE archive.org account ..

Paris Subway Opera

https://archive.org/details/paris_subway_opera

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while the main topic of the OLD.RIP blog is mind over weather research which i’m currently into, the filming capacity makes it possible to capture some weather phenomena in rapid change, in case i need to do that one day. i carry two cameras around whole the time everywhere i go and i may be lucky to capture again some other interesting life events as well.

about the videos of the opera in subway, to give you an idea how lucky these shots are: i don’t know the singers and i don’t know the pieces they were singing.. i had no idea who was going to sing and what’s the story of their acting, while shooting and trying to guess what’s going to happen next. it may look like i knew what i was doing — i did not. that’s a beginner’s luck i suppose. usually i’m running from one place to another on tight schedule, with no time to stop even for a minute, thus that was also a luck that the subway trains were running on time and not stopped for yet another issue which is very often the case. i had a half an hour left before the next meeting. i don’t like to cancel meetings and try to be always on time, even before the scheduled time to respect the time of others, no matter how little important the meeting is and possible to cancel or postpone with no consequences. thus getting these shots in my busy life is quite exceptional. i hope i will be able to make more free time in my life one day but so far it’s been so busy that i often sleep one day out of two, working on my projects whole night long with no sleep every other day. there’s the answer why i don’t have the time to edit the sound and even less so as i don’t have a computer for a quick editing.. some ten years already — as a homeless person for a very long time it’s just a habit — a computer would be yet another fragile thing to carry around whole the time, with no safe place to leave behind, demanding more time and places to find for charging, solving constant software issues and so on. by having no computer i have reduced a lot of headache in my life, and got a bit of time for sleeping just enough not to lose my health.

also i don’t have facebook, twitter or any other social media related to the blog. read more here..

https://old.rip/2022/12/28/social-sharing/

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the camera used in filming is Panasonic AG-UX180. after studying the two user manuals total of 500 pages (finished reading a week ago) and making several quick tests, i only began the real filming tests literally a few days before spotting the opera singers and deciding to film, thus these are some of my very first real life videos taken without any preparation. i’m making many mistakes because all the other cameras i used in the past are different. this one is more professional, with around 30 physical buttons/switches and several turn dials on the camera and many more menu settings accessible on screen. the buttons, switches and dials need to be reached by feeling while filming, so after first few videos i switched the camera to the automatic mode giving the control over the most of settings (not all) to the camera, to better concentrate on the composition side of filming. thus as a very beginner with a pro camera the mistakes are normal. also, i had to turn my head every few seconds while filming, to see if my bags are still there, so lots of shaking and out of frame moves come from the quick looks behind the back and sideways not to let my things on the subway floor to be stolen. the sound level on camera was set too high for the loud opera voices, but this i realised only later while reviewing the videos. as mentioned above, the sound levels and settings are different on the channels, specifically for such situations, thus in post production it is possible to recover almost a perfect sound from the original file while discarding the channel which is clipping. some of the shaking in video can also be removed in post production by using the original file. as i don’t have a computer i’m doing all with a several years old smartphone, but powerful enough for even 4k editing when needed. it would take too much of my valuable time to work with 4k files so i shoot mostly in 1080p. also, even though it’s possible to do lots of editing tricks on the phone it would reduce the quality of the output too much even for sharing online for at least minimally professional look, therefore i always try to shoot videos in a way which would require a minimum amount of editing, to be able to post the file closest to the original. the only things i did with the videos were: cropped the beginning and the end, reframed from 16:9 original file for a cinematic look (i was shooting with guidelines for such editing later), and reduced framerate from 50fps to 25fps. the editing app on my android phone reduced the bitrate automatically from the original file of 50mbps to whatever it decided was the best for sharing, to 8mbps.. and online services applied their own file compression as well, so the videos you see online are far from the original quality.

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in conclusion, there are many exploring mistakes of filming yet to come before i’ll have no more excuses for a bad quality in some places in the videos i shoot. as of these videos — i’m happy enough with the shots i succeeded to get in the “run and gun” situation.

big thanks to the singers who probably thought i’m a professional videographer and performed great for the camera. i gave them my contact while offering all the original footage for free, but probably upon learning that i’m a beginner who’s only trying out the art of filming i never heard back from them [at the time of editing the article a week after the event, three days after first posting the article]. my offer of the original footage to singers for free still stands, so if you’re reading this article better get in touch with me asap, before i’ll change my mind due to lack of interest from your part. so far the copyright is mine as of a documented event in a public place. i’m looking for an interested party in broadcasting to show on tv the public life event in the subway of paris. don’t be late. all my respect to you singers — i did the best from my part, now please get in touch with me to also have the original footage, so you can decide for yourself what to do with it.

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by the way, i’m not even sure these shots are very special — there are always good singers in that spot in subway when i pass by (i’m not very often going through that area though), and in other locations in subway as well. i’m not an expert to tell who’s better — some beginners may have a great talent and sound like professionals. as a beginner in filming i’m trying to learn how these things work — i mean selling the lucky shots to a broadcaster. even though i have some acting experience myself in the past and have great contacts, those are different ones from tv broadcasting. so, if you can give me some advice whom to contact and what are the rules of the business with such footage, please let me know — all and any help very welcome.

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